Loki's Dead Again
by Sarah1281
Summary: Thor has just broken the news to his friends that, once again, Loki is dead. This time it's definitely true. They have to admit dying in Thor's arms is pretty compelling evidence but how many times does Loki have to die before it sticks?


Loki's Dead Again

After Thor delivered the news and left again, the silence stretched out between them.

It was strange. She had mourned for him once already and then mourned even deeper once she realized just to what depths her once-friend had fallen since leaving Asgard. It would be kinder for everybody if he had just stayed dead out there in the void, even for him.

The first time it had been painful and confusing and unexpected and she had been left wondering just how things had spiraled so far out of control so fast and whether or not she could have done anything differently. She did not, would not, _could not_, blame herself for Loki's incomprehensible choices but that hadn't made facing the grieving royal family any easier.

One day it business as usual and 'I don't really want to follow Thor on his stupid suicidal quest but I'm only going to complain a little as I tag along' and the next it was 'I'm going to kill you all.' Maybe she had committed treason – she really had to get out of the habit of doing that – but Loki had sent a destroyer to kill them. To kill _Thor_. None of it made sense.

He must have been mad. That was the only answer she had been able to come up with after all the long hours of wondering what went wrong. It was easier to just pretend those last three terrible days had never happened and focus on the Loki she had known and loved for a millennia instead.

But then had come Earth and the shocked joy of discovery he yet lived was muted by all of them by the knowledge of what he had done. And then had come imprisonment on Asgard and the burning knowledge that he was there and he hated all of them and did not repent one bit that made it so very difficult to put him out of their minds for all that they did not go see him.

And now there was another death, a far better one this time.

It didn't feel real this time.

"So," Sif said, breaking the silence. "Loki's dead. Again."

"And just on the heels of Queen Frigga's death as well," Volstagg remarked, shaking his head mournfully. "And Thor's in the midst of a tragic doomed love with that Midgardian woman."

"I hope Hogun comes back soon," Fandral said. "Thor needs all of us in this difficult time."

Sif nodded her agreement. "I'm sure he'll be here soon. I'm actually a little surprised he didn't return after the Queen's death but I suppose news might travel slower and there was really nothing he could have done. He can be so unsentimental sometimes."

"I just…I can't _believe _he didn't even have the decency of betraying him first!" Fandral burst out suddenly.

"Loki?" Volstagg asked.

"No, the Allfather," Fandral said sarcastically. "Of course Loki! He seems to have decided that betrayal is his _thing_ recently."

"I'm not sure I follow," Volstagg said. "You're annoyed that, during the extremely important quest to save all of the nine realms, Loki heroically sacrificed himself and didn't risk the destruction of everything by betraying Thor?"

"Put like that it does sound a little petty," Fandral complained.

Sif shook her head. "No, I think I know where you're coming from. Obviously, from what Thor said, stopping Malekith was a very narrow thing. Without Loki's cooperation and with him causing trouble by betraying Thor again we might have all been killed."

"I'm sorry, I thought you had just said you could see where _I _was coming from," Fandral said, annoyed.

"You didn't let me finish," Sif said. "On the other hand…we all knew it was coming. We all knew that Loki was beyond hope at this point and that it would take him _years _to even begin to want to come back from this. We all knew that he would betray us and so we had to take that into account. But he didn't. Not only did he do exactly what he said he would but apparently he defended Jane Foster several times and he even got killed killing the creature who killed the Queen and who was moments away from killing Thor, too."

"Well I'm certainly glad that you get it, Sif, because I still do not," Volstagg said.

Sif smiled sadly at him. "How easy would it be to hate him if he died betraying us in our hour of need when it was clearly in his best interest not to allow the nine realms to be destroyed out of petty jealousy and rage?"

"Ah, I see," Volstagg said, blinking a few times. "But surely it is better to be able to remember him this way than if he had behaved as we expected."

"Maybe we shouldn't have expected him to betray us," Sif mused. "After all, the stakes were so very high and there was nothing Loki loathed more than being predictable. And he was almost even _nice _to his mother."

"I don't see why we're all just sitting here pretending that we actually think Loki's dead this time," Fandral said suddenly.

"Pretending?" Volstagg repeated. "Who's pretending?"

"What do you mean?" Sif asked. "You don't think Loki's dead?"

"Well it's not like this is the first time he's faked his own death!" Fandral exclaimed. "Or the second or the third or the tenth…"

"No," Sif conceded. "But usually he doesn't stay fake-dead for more than a couple of hours."

"And I really don't think that after the Bifrost was destroyed should count since he didn't so much fake his own death as neglect to let us know he was alive before he showed up to conquer Midgard," Volstagg said. "Chances are, he was just as surprised to survive the void as any of us are that he did. After all, no matter how clever and powerful Loki may be, falling through a void is not exactly something he's going to want to experiment with."

"I'm just saying that we've all been fooled before and I, for one, refuse to be fooled again. And there would be nothing half so annoying as mourning him as a hero only to find out that, heroic actions or not, he's not even dead. And that makes any heroic actions he did undertake immediately suspect and not half as impressive," Fandral said.

"But this is different," Sif protested. "There was a body and everything. He died in Thor's arms after being stabbed through like his mother and Thor's certainly been around enough to know what death looks like!"

"Loki has magical illusion powers," Fandral countered. "Thor said that he made him look like you, Sif."

"He's not a child anymore and this isn't a game. Why would he fake his own death in the middle of trying to stop Malekith and risk Thor not being able to stop him?" Sif challenged.

"Even if he had behaved perfectly and single-handedly saved the day without betraying anyone at all, he was never going to walk away from what he's done," Fandral pointed out. "He was going to have to spend a few years in prison and at the mercy of people he now claims to hate."

"He couldn't just escape because then he'd have people hunting him and, even if they couldn't catch him, they'd be more on guard against his tricks," Sif realized.

Fandral nodded. "Exactly. And maybe he just saw the perfect opportunity to 'die' there and didn't want to risk not having as good of an opportunity later."

"I'm not saying that I agree with this," Volstagg said slowly. "But dying before the day was saved certainly makes his death seem more authentic than if he had conveniently died right after we had won. And the risk of Thor not winning would be there."

Fandral shrugged. "Perhaps he simply has faith in Thor."

"He _should_ after all that time he'd been jealous of him," Sif said. She sighed. "Listen, Fandral, it's a nice theory but-"

"Nice?" Fandral interrupted. "More like terrifying. At least if Loki were dead we'd know what to expect. I can't say that I fancy the thought of him coming back at any point to do Odin only knows what. Is he still mad at us for that whole treason thing? For locking him up? Is he still quite mad?"

Volstagg gave him a strange look. "I must say, Fandral, that if you don't want him to still be alive then you are spending a rather excessive amount of time trying to figure out how he could be."

"It's not that I want him to be alive but it's not like I don't, actually. Like Sif said, he was a friend for so long that this insane and evil period is just hard to come to terms with. Regardless of what I want, I still don't think he's dead."

"He's Loki," Sif said simply. "How could he be dead?"

"How could the Queen?" Volstagg countered. "I am beginning to suspect, after everything that happened, that we Aesir are not as good with death as are other shorter-lived species."

"There's nothing we can do one way or another," Fandral pointed out. "We should be on our guard but we should always be there anyway. Chances are, whatever Loki's planning we'll never see it coming."

"I haven't conceded he's alive yet," Volstagg said.

"If he's not then the odds of him planning something are marginally lower," Fandral replied. "I wouldn't count him out, though. Should we tell Thor what we-"

"You," Volstagg interrupted.

"I suspect?" Fandral continued smoothly.

Sif shook her head. "No, the uncertainly would kill him and we have no proof or even real reason to think this except that it is _Loki_. He needs closure."

"You believe he'd rather think that Loki is dead than alive?" Volstagg asked.

Sif considered this. "I think that he will always want Loki alive and with the hope, however much he might want to deny it, that he could come back to us someday. I know that I certainly believe that if he can avoid getting himself killed long enough then sooner or later he'll get his act together. But is it healthy for him to always wonder? No. Let Thor believe the only evidence that we have until Loki returns. Let him have the matter settled no matter which way it turns out."

"Until?" Fandral repeated, looking pleased. "Have I convinced you then, Lady Sif?"

"Don't flatter yourself."

Loki being alive might one day be a good thing but Sif was sure that there would be so much pain before that could ever happen. As much as she had mourned him, it really would be easier if he were simply laid to rest.

And that was perhaps the biggest reason she couldn't accept that it was true.


End file.
